Samsung and LG are to invest $17 Billion dollars to supply Apple with OLED panels, the problem for LG Display is that the deal is only for OLED display screens for smartphones and tablets and not large screen OLED TV’s.
Samsung who is set to use next week’s CES Show in Las Vegas to push new SUHD TV technology as opposed to OLED, this week announced that the Korean Company plans to unveil six games for its smart TV at the upcoming CES convention.
The company will demonstrate the games including the Asphalt 8 racing game.
It will also team up with Sony to launch more streaming games using the PlayStation Now platform for its smart TV.
“We are also planning to introduce the PS Now game platform here in the near future when there is enough demand for video games,” said a Samsung official. He added that users would be able to enjoy as many as 400 streaming games next year.
Kim Young-chan, vice-president of Samsung’s visual display business unit, said: “To meet the growing demands for TVs as an entertainment tool, Samsung Electronics will expand partnerships with game companies and offer more diversified game services down the road.”
The move by Samsung to push their existing TV display technology is a blow to LG who is looking for partners to invest in OLED TV technology.
This week LG Display officials confirmed to ChannelNews that are going to invest a total of $7billion over 3 years to deliver panels for Apple who have demand that all contracts only have a 1% margin.
The first panels will consist of 30,000 flexible OLED panels per month based on the size of a Gen.6 board.
LG Display executives said that they plan to start small and gradually expand the size of the panels they produce.
If LG Display increases production capability up to 60,000 sheets in the future, it will be able to mass-produce 200 million 5-inch OLED panels per year.
Korean IT predicted that Samsung Display will be allotted with 30% more volume than LG Display because it already has systems that can mass-produce Smartphone OLEDs right away.
Samsung is also currently discussing with Apple about supplying 90,000 sheets per month for 2 to 3 years.
Samsung Display said that they are concerned that LG Display will steal Samsung manufacturing secrets as a result they are approaching the supply relationship with “caution”.
Analysts estimate that the plant can start supplying Apple with OLED panels “as early as 2017.”
